Doctors say it hits you like a ton of bricks. With a 102-degree fever, you struggle to get out of bed. With chills, sweats and body aches, it can be deadly for some. And once you get it, you will never want to experience it again. The flu is here.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is reporting this to be one of the more difficult flu seasons the nation has seen in several years and New Jersey has not been spared.

The state’s health department is reporting “high levels of flu activity” throughout the state, including Mercer County.

The flu has already claimed two lives in New Jersey this season: A 14-year-old boy died in Ocean County in November, and an 8-month-old boy died Camden County in December, according to Mary O’Dowd, the state’s health commissioner. Both boys had underlying medical conditions, according to the Health Department.

The numbers are alarming. During the last week of 2012, there were more than twice the reported number of emergency room visits attributable to influenza as there were during the same week in 2011, according to the CDC.

Throughout Mercer County, health officials are reporting an increase in the number of patients visiting emergency rooms and urgent care clinics with flu-like symptoms.
Dr. Mark Magariello, director of the AfterOurs Urgent Care office in Robbinsville, said he noticed an increase in patients over the last two weeks. He said he hasn't seen an increase this large in the last two to three years.

“I have seen triple the amount of actual flu — influenza, over the last two, three weeks,” Magariello said.

At St. Francis Medical Center in Trenton, Daniel Oscislawski, chief of emergency medicine, said he noticed the number of patients has spiked since Sunday.

“On Sunday we saw 123 patients, which is about 20 percent more than we usually do,” he said. “On Monday and Tuesday the volume was up (another) 25 percent.”

Oscislawski said about 20 percent of the 157 patients that were seen on Tuesday had the flu.

Capital Health has also seen an increase of patients in all three of their emergency rooms over the last couple weeks, said patient services Vice President Eileen Horton.

“You can see that it’s rising,” she said last night. “(Thursday) in particular was a very bad day.”

Horton said that a typical week during flu season, 5 percent of the patients that come in to Capital Health have the flu. But there were periods of they day yesterday when 50 percent of the patients were diagnosed with the flu, she said.

Flu season typically last from September to April and peaks around January. This year, everything is ahead of schedule.

Horton speculated that the weather and the time of the year may have helped spread the virus more quickly.

“Maybe, over the holidays, people were getting together more,” she said. “When it gets mild, people are out and about more and germs can spread more easily.”

Oscislawski said he hopes that what everyone is experiencing now is the peak, but Capital Health epidemiologist Dr. Marc Whitman said it’s too early to tell.

“It sounds like the flu season started earlier,” he said. “In my opinion, it peaked earlier than it’s peaked at a long time. We are getting a lot of cases earlier then we usually get them.”

This season’s strain of influenza is also a contributing factor. It’s a new strain (H3N2), and few people have built up an immunity, said Dr. Joel Maslow, head of the division of infectious diseases at Morristown Memorial Hospital.

Whitman said this strain of influenza is more resilient, spreading more quickly and causing people to become more sick.

And as hospitals continue to see more and more flu patients, they’ve increased efforts to keep the healthy people healthy.

“It’s a very difficult situation,” Horton said. “We’re taking precautions in our waiting room so that people that possibly have the flu don’t infect other people that are waiting.”

Capital Health has even restricted visitors to help stop the spread of the flu, she said.

In addition to washing your hands frequently and staying home when you feel sick, physicians say it’s not too late to get the flu shot.

Magariello said AfterOurs has plenty of vaccines to give out, but he has been hearing from some of his patients that some of the pharmacies are running out of flu medication, such as Tamiflu.

“It’s better to get (the vaccine) now,” he said. “People don’t understand what the flu is like until they get it.”

St. Francis spokeswoman Valerie Metzger said that the hospital’s clinic in the Hamilton ShopRite is running low on the vaccine, but it isn’t expected to run out.

“They only had 35 (doses yesterday) morning and they’re placing another order today,” she said. “We shouldn’t run out, but we’re definitely monitoring the number we have.”

The CDC recommends that everyone 6 months of age and older get a seasonal flu vaccine each year.

“If you are the parent or guardian of a child under the age of 6 months, please get a flu shot not only to protect yourself but also to protect your baby,” said Deputy Health Commissioner Arturo Brito.

Whitman said that getting the vaccine is the best way to prevent the flu from spreading.

“We have the ability to put a stop to this,” he said. “All they have to do is get the flu shot.”

Staff Writer Emily Brill and the Star-Ledger contributed to this report.